Internet platforms will be required to remove all terrorism-related content within one hour of being reported, else sanctions await, according to a proposal presented to the European Parliament by European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, who said during his last State of the Union address that those who fail to comply would be subject to stiff sanctions by the bloc. David Ibsen, the Executive Director of The Counter Extremism Project, was quick to commend the Commission for taking a positive step towards combatting extremist content online but said the new measures fall short of a clear solution to the growing problem of illegal content online. “The fact that the Commission is proposing a Regulation, as opposed to a Directive, shows the seriousness of the issue. We, at the Counter Extremism Project, have seen that content is downloaded and consistently re-uploaded across the same platforms it was previously taken down from. This cannot continue. Reliable enforcement and automated technology so that content can be taken down within one hour of upload need to be included in the proposed draft,” said Ibsen.